ASUW Seattle challenges UWT’s student government processes and leadership
Members of the ASUW Board of Directors passed a bill Dec. 4 that did not recognize the current ASUWT president in their current role.
By Michaela Ely
Since the removal of Elias Feleke from the role of ASUWT President, ASUW has engaged in actions that challenge ASUWT as an organization, including ASUWT’s leadership.
“ASUW has taken a heavy interest into our process and everything. It starts out with Nandana Jaideep. That’s the ASUW of Seattle president. She’s been coming to Senate meetings, exec [board] meetings,” ASUWT Pre-major Senator Zaid Namaat told The Ledger. “I’m just a little concerned why she’s not worrying about her campus, and, you know, she’s taking, trying to take matters into her own hands, and coming into our campus and listening in on stuff.”
Former ASUWT President Elias Feleke reached out to The Ledger Dec. 19 to address discrepancies and source attribution in regards to articles published on Nov. 24 and Dec. 15. In this correspondence, he provided a copy of ASUW Board Bill 6.01, “Addressing Misrepresentations of Inter-Association Communication by the Vice President of ASUWT.” The Board Bill was passed Dec. 4 and did not recognize the current ASUWT president as being president and criticized their representations of ASUW as being uncommunicative due to Elias Feleke’s removal.
The bill was submitted by ASUW President, Nandana Jaideep. The bill was discussed at a Dec. 4 ASUW Board of Directors (BOD) meeting and the minutes detail the proceedings; however, the embedded link that would contain the text of said bill is not working, stating that the link and access has been removed. During the Dec. 4 ASUW BOD meeting, ASUW President Jaideep and other members of ASUW referred to ASUWT’s current president as the vice president, and there was debate over the language being too accusatory and not wanting to “fight fire with fire.”
“The reason [Board Bill] 6.01 exists is because certain members of ASUW Tacoma chose to air out personal grievances at a stage, such as the Board of Regents. This was our response to that, saying that that’s not OK and let’s have a more professional meeting to discuss anything of such sort. That request was ignored and this came out of that, which is again airing up personal grievances on a public state such as the Senate,” ASUW President Jaideep said in the Jan. 26 ASUW Senate Steering meeting. “I’m uncomfortable repealing this bill because instead of coming to us and facilitating healthy tri-campus relationships, we keep going in circles and this bill is our intentional effort to let them know that we’re here to fix this in like a professional manner.”
Elias Feleke’s brother and former ASUW president, Jacob Feleke, has also spoken up on his behalf since the removal. Jacob Feleke graduated from UW Seattle in 2024. Jacob Feleke has made statements on his brother’s behalf at the Nov. 25 ASUWT Senate meeting, the Dec. 5 ASUWT Executive Board meeting and was present at the Jan. 14 ASUWT Senate meeting to make a public comment regarding “rogue senators” that advocated for a joint resolution during an ASUW Senate meeting.
ASUWT Speaker of the Senate Bryce Scholten and Pre-major Senator Namaat were present at the Jan. 13 ASUW Senate Floor meeting to speak in support of Senate Joint Resolution JR-32-2, “A Joint Resolution with Tri-Campus Support to Improve Tri-Campus Relations and Joint Efforts.” Speaker Scholten stated that he was not there to represent ASUWT’s beliefs, nor the beliefs of ASUWT’s Senate; rather he wanted to speak to his own experience with ASUWT and address the claims of ASUW’s Board Bill 6.01. Jacob Feleke’s comment about “rogue senators” at the Jan. 14 ASUWT Senate meeting was in reference to this incident.
“This bill should have been an email to President Watkins, the ASUWT President and whoever is responsible for cross campus communications on the ASUW Board of Directors. By addressing President Watkins as the ASUWT Vice President, the ASUW Board of Directors has ignored our Senate’s decisions and actions, which we find extremely disrespectful and inflammatory to both ASUWT and our Senate,” Speaker Scholten said at the Jan. 13 ASUW Senate Floor meeting.
The joint resolution was sponsored by Joseph Riggio, ASUW Student Senate Vice Speaker and Ella Spurlock, GPSS UAW 4121 Senator. The summary of this piece of legislation talks about a “consolidation of power by previous ASUW Seattle Boards of Directors” in contrast to their other governing partners, namely the ASUW Senate, and how it has impacted progress at the Seattle, Bothell and Tacoma campuses. It asks for a repeal of Board Bill 6.01 as well as more consistent collaboration between the three campuses.
“I’m not here to speak on behalf of ASUWT or my students I represent, but rather the internal issues I personally witnessed since my term has started. Following former ASUWT President Elias Feleke’s removal, the ASUW Board of Directors has taken an interest in the internal operations of ASUWT and it has expressed strong support for the former president appearing at Senate and Executive Directors meetings to support comments made by and in support of the former ASUWT President.” Senator Namaat said at the Jan. 13 ASUW Senate Floor meeting. “At the same time, the ASUW President has spread false misinformation. Sorry, has spread false information about the ASUWT President, Rae Watkins, implicating them in illegal activities and addressing them as Vice President.”
Former Director of Legislative Affairs for ASUWT Ben Brown was also present at the meeting to speak in favor of JR-32-2. He referenced several instances where ASUW’s President, current and former, attempted to undermine ASUWT’s efforts to represent their students.
“As the Director of Legislative Affairs last year, I was part of the effort to officially establish Huskies on the Hill as a tri-campus legislative and planning event because of internal and personal conflicts within ASUW Seattle or within ASUW. ASUW’s previous president refused to sign the MOU. This forced Bothell and Tacoma to set aside this effort due to disorder in ASUW’s own administration,” Brown said at the Jan. 13 ASUW Senate Floor meeting.
Members of ASUWT have attempted on a few different occasions to create a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to establish Huskies on the Hill as a tri-campus effort. Huskies on the Hill is a lobbying event that occurs during the legislative session, usually in February, and involves students and members of student government from all of UW’s campuses; however, it is officially a UW Seattle event, even though all three campuses and four student governments are involved in the planning and execution of the event.
A Jan. 26 ASUW Senate Steering meeting had the newest version of this MOU, JR-32-4, “A Joint Resolution Establishing a Tri-Campus Memorandum of Understanding,” on the agenda for the meeting. While minutes for that meeting are not yet available, it is labeled as failed on the agenda itself. This MOU also calls for the repealing of Board Bill 6.01. The minutes for the Jan. 26 Senate Steering meeting have JR-32-4 as being tabled for another week, but it did not appear on the agenda for the Feb. 2 ASUW Senate Steering meeting.
Meeting minutes and agendas for the ASUW Senate have been difficult to access as their official website is not updated; however their Instagram contains a Linktree that provides access to their public records. This includes access to their legislation, including the joint resolutions.
During the Jan. 16 ASUW Senate Steering meeting, JR-32-3 was discussed, which is a revision of JR-32-2 as the original bill was withdrawn and resubmitted with a few changes. It has been criticized by ASUW BOD members for improperly representing a situation with ASUW’s former Director of Legislative Affairs and misrepresenting other members of ASUW’s BOD.
“I wouldn’t be comfortable like supporting the sort of legislation where the whereas clauses contain like defamatory, mischaracterizing and inaccurate representation of certain members of my organization, my board, and in fact myself too. So even if the that clauses, which I don’t think are effective, were effective, this bill wouldn’t be something that I would be proud to pass as an organization,” ASUW President Jaideep said in the Jan. 16 ASUW Senate Steering meeting.
Involvement by ASUWT and ASUWB students in the writing of this resolution has also been criticized for being one-sided and placing blame almost exclusively on ASUW.
“I know that ASUWT and ASUW Bothell students have been heavily involved in the drafting of this bill and when these students came to our Senate, they didn’t address us in in terms of like, hey, we’ve all made mistakes, but here are some like systems we can have to make things better. It was insulting. It was condescending. They were giving misleading information to our senators who had no context and they were not following process,” ASUW Academic & Administrative Affairs Committee Chair Dylan Bianchi said in the Jan. 16 ASUW Senate Steering meeting.
During this meeting JR-32-3 was tabled until the Jan. 26 ASUW Senate Steering meeting; however, it was not on the agenda for that meeting.
“There’s also a serious issue of representation and legal exposure that cannot be ignored. The ASUWT Senate meeting scheduled last week was canceled due to OPMA concerns for reasons that have not been publicly clarified. Despite this, ASUWT is referred in this resolution previously as an honorable mention, which last week was evidence of formal discussion and debate or authorization of that body which constitutes another form of misrepresentation. Additionally, there’s an active Superior Court injunction involving ASUWT currently pending in Pierce County,” ASUW President Jaideep said in the Jan. 16 ASUW Senate Steering meeting.
ASUW President Jaideep is likely referring to the Dec. 2 injunction filed by Elias Feleke that names ASUWT, UW Tacoma and two members of ASUWT as another injunction that was filed Dec. 10 was dismissed due to a failure to appear in court by Elias Feleke. A court date for a hearing has been set for April 3, but it is unclear what will come of it.
While the meeting minutes for the Feb. 2 ASUW Senate Steering meeting are not yet available, the agenda did not contain any of the joint resolutions previously discussed. It did include a discussion of an ASUW Senate bill, SB-32-01, “A Senate Bill on Institutional Reform.” This bill proposes a series of reforms to the ASUW bylaws and details a series of institutional issues within ASUW. It also refers to a loss of student trust and complaints in recent years.
It is currently unclear if any of the proposed joint resolutions will be discussed at future meetings.
